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Dropbox app on my Mac is stuck. "Reconnecting to the internet. This may take a moment".
Dropbox is saying that it is "Reconnecting to the internet. This may take a moment", but it seems stuck like this for ages.
What I've tried:
- Signed out. Signed back in
- Signed out. Restarted. Signed back in. Restarted.
- Switched it off / on again
- Checked my firewall settings (all seems good)
- Removed my dropbox cache files
- Completely removed Dropbox from my Mac (using CleanMyMac) and reinstalled it.
My ~/Dropbox folder is now empty (but all my files are still online in my account - phew)
How can I get my dropbox working again? Is there a way to debug what it's trying to do?
My system:
- Mac (Intel) Sequoia 15.5
- Dropbox 227.4.4774
- Plenty of drive space left (local and on Dropbox)
Providing an update ... support from the support team has been absolutely appalling for the most part. Not only the slow response, but providing actions for things I have already said that I've done, telling me they can see I'm on an older version of the app when I'm on the latest version (that they pointed me to), sending me links to articles that aren't the articles they're referring to.
All that said, if anyone has this problem. The only way I could seem to fix it was to:
- blast away everything to do with Dropbox from my Mac, including my files
- install a fresh copy of the Dropbox.app
- disable the File Provider as part of the installation
- wait 5 million years for my files to download and sync. Things will work, stop working, work again, half work, stop working, work again. Just leave it for like for ever
- re-enable File Provider
- pray to whatever god you believe it
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Providing an update ... support from the support team has been absolutely appalling for the most part. Not only the slow response, but providing actions for things I have already said that I've done, telling me they can see I'm on an older version of the app when I'm on the latest version (that they pointed me to), sending me links to articles that aren't the articles they're referring to.
All that said, if anyone has this problem. The only way I could seem to fix it was to:
- blast away everything to do with Dropbox from my Mac, including my files
- install a fresh copy of the Dropbox.app
- disable the File Provider as part of the installation
- wait 5 million years for my files to download and sync. Things will work, stop working, work again, half work, stop working, work again. Just leave it for like for ever
- re-enable File Provider
- pray to whatever god you believe it
- Nancy
Dropbox Community Moderator
I can totally understand your frustration. Due to their workload, our advanced team may not reply right away.
However, they have account visibility that we don’t here on the forum, so they can look into your Dropbox account and provide personalized troubleshooting steps that can help more with the issue you’re facing.
Yes but I've been waiting ages for them to get back to me. They replied only once and asked for information I had already provided in my initial ticket. Not a very encouraging start :(
- Nancy
Thanks for all the info you’ve shared with us so far, CarlJoseph; we appreciate it.
I can see in our system that you’ve also been in touch with our support team and your ticket is currently in the hands of our specialists.
Please keep an eye out for their reply, as they’ll get back to you in the same email thread.
It's syncing, occasionally. The only time I can get it to budge is when I change the network or turn my network off/on. That seems to kick it into gear for a few seconds, it'll sync a few files, then flake out again.
So annoying
Tried yet again (this is so frustrating) - completely obliterated everything Dropbox from my Mac. From ~/Library/CloudStorage/Dropbox folder, .pref files, cache files, absolutely everything.
Rebooted. Reinstalled Dropbox using the offline installer. Selected only one small folder to sync.
Nothing. Nada. Niente.
Same problem. Re-enabled File Provider and it still looks stuck. Without File Provider it seemed to just download the index of files, not the files themselves.
My ~/Library/CloudStorage now looks like this: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/4e22dw1hjxvr6ws5ri9pa/Screenshot-2025-07-08-at-11.27.33.png?rlkey=vb3jsg7j37tg1iyfwhcyw54hq&st=kxbmyrrx&dl=0
Here's a video of what it looks like when I change from my phone hotspot to my local network. Both internet connections show the same problems:
- https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/clfl06hrbx9b7nviaobyu/Screen-Recording-2025-07-08-at-12.34.06.mp4?rlkey=zv0ki04zyecy1350i6bijiib1&st=0os79deh&dl=0
- https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/0cctqbdyiqjbaod5g8b1y/Screen-Recording-2025-07-08-at-12.35.30.mp4?rlkey=tyjttimbz2hq7fk1dd3a1fth3&st=scqoaftz&dl=0
No luck. It just pulled down the index of all the files (kept many of the files online it seemed). When I turned File Provider back it, it's just stuck trying to connect like before.
This is extremely frustrating. What's more is that I put in an actual support request but am getting zero response from them, even though I'm paying. Appreciate you trying to help me here.
My ~/Library/CloudStorage looks like this:
- Hannah
Sounds good, Carl!
Please keep us updated with the results.
Thanks!
Already checked, date/time/location are all correct, and using a personal network
Have just reinstalled again and this time opted to not use the File Provider. It seems to be syncing my docs so that's a good start. Once it's finished, I'll enable File Provider and see that happens.
